Darker Shadows (A Harry Potter Fan Fiction)

Chapter 4- Timetables (Ava)

Chapter 4 (Ava)

I walked down to the Great Hall on my own, not bothering to check to see if Draco was already awake. If he was, he was probably holding Pansy’s hand or something stupid.

When I walked through the doors, Professor Dumbledore saw me and waved me over. I was a bit surprised that he wanted to talk to me.

I walked up to the teachers’ table and managed to muster up a smile. He smiled back at me, but his eyes looked more concerned than happy. He was probably worried about Lord Voldemort. He cleared his throat,

“Ava, sorry, I wanted to have a meeting with you in my office but you’ll be given your timetable in a few minutes and I wanted to talk to you before you received it.”

I nodded,

“Okay.”

“Your lessons are quite different to last year’s. Obviously you’re now older than everyone else so we have put you in some classes with the seventh years, but you also have a couple of extra classes with teachers alone, and some with the sixth year. We’ve worked out that this should help you catch up on what you mostly need to know.”

I gulped,

“The sixth year?”

Dumbledore nodded,

“Yes. Professor McGonagall and I have agreed that this is suitable.”

 I took a deep breath,

“Okay, thank you. I think I’ll probably go and get some breakfast now.”
I turned around before Dumbledore could say anything else. I noticed Draco walking in with Pansy, and as he sat down at the table, I sat down next to him. Pansy stared at me,

“Hey! I was going to sit next to Draco!”

I shrugged my shoulders apologetically,

“I need to talk to him. You can sit next to him later.”

She stood behind me for a moment before reluctantly walking over to sit somewhere further down the table.

I turned to Draco and muttered into his ear,

“I have lessons with the sixth year on my timetable. I have lessons with Harry.”

Draco looked at me,

“With us? Why?”

I shrugged,

“To help me catch up, Dumbledore said. But it means I have lessons with Harry. I haven’t spoken to him since-”

“Ava! Have you even started to think about it? About what you have to do? Planned it at all?”

I stared at him in shock,

“No! Draco, why would I have done?”

He looked at me,

“You know why you have to do it.”

The image of Fred’s body falling to the floor flashed up in my mind for a moment. I swallowed the lump in my throat and whispered,

“How can I do it?”

“Think of a plan, Ava. You have to do it.”

I imagined myself taking Harry to Voldemort. I imagined the flash of green, Harry’s dead body on the floor and closed my eyes to stop any tears from escaping.

Professor McGonagall walked along, giving us all our timetables. Mine was a mixture of lessons and study periods with certain teachers.

Draco showed me his and asked what lessons we were going to have together but I was too terrified to see. In the end he just smiled,